Report: Iranian warships dock in Sudan in show of support

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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (L) meets with Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir in Khartoum on September 26, 2011.

Story highlights

Two Iranian warships are at Port Sudan, Sudanese state media report

Their visit is a show of support and friendship, Iran and Sudan say

An airstrike destroyed an arms factory in Sudan last week; Iran and Sudan blame Israel

Sudan denies that the factory was producing arms for Iran or its allies

Two Iranian warships have docked in Sudan carrying "a message of support and friendship," Sudanese state media said.

The ships arrived in Port Sudan on Sunday and will stay until Wednesday, according to SUNA, the official Sudanese news agency.

The presence "clearly shows the solid support of political and diplomatic relationships between the Sudanese and Iranian navies," the agency quoted Sudanese army spokesman Savarmi Khaled Saad as saying Monday.

The warships arrived less than a week after a weapons factory in Khartoum was bombed, killing two people, in what Sudanese officials said was an airstrike by Israel.

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The Sudanese Foreign Ministry issued a statement Monday condemning what it called "a brutal assault carried out by the State of Israel" on the Yarmouk Industrial Complex, SUNA said.

It also dismissed suggestions that the weapons factory was manufacturing arms for Iran or its allies, denying "any link between the Sudanese military manufacturing output and any external party," according to SUNA

The statement accused Israel of using "misleading leaks" to the media to allege that the factory had ties "to the states of Iran and Syria and to the Islamic Resistance Movement in Palestine (Hamas), and to Hezbollah in Lebanon."

Iran has no need for weapons to be manufactured in Sudan, the Foreign Ministry statement insisted.